This James Beard Nominee Started Her Restaurant By Googling 'How Do You Start A Food Business'

Thuy Pham, a hairstylist turned chef, shares how she morphed a great idea into a successful business during the pandemic.

In April 2020, Thuy Pham, a Portland, Oregon-based hairstylist, was locked down like the rest of the country at the start of the coronavirus pandemic. To keep her daughter and her clients engaged, she started cooking a soy-based vegan pork belly on Instagram Live. The venture took off, and in November 2020, Pham opened Vietnamese vegan restaurant Mama Dút (translates to “mama will feed you”), and she’s currently building a second location. In 2022, the James Beard Foundation named her a semifinalist in the Emerging Chef category. For this edition of Voices in Food, Pham talked with Garin Pirnia about her unexpected career trajectory, her experiences as a Vietnamese refugee and how we need to invest more in women of color.

I grew up cooking with my mom. As a single parent, she relied on me to help do the prep work and things like that, and I loved cooking. Cooking was one of those moments that I was able to spend quality time with my mom, because she worked so much. It was always a happy place for me.